One True Theory of Love (5 page)

“Well, that’s where we play,” Henry said. “Himmel Park.”

“You live on Third Street?” Meg was both jealous and wistful. “That’s my very favorite street in the whole city.”

Palm trees lined the wide street, which was closed to all but local traffic and used primarily as a bike route for students and professors. The houses were old—some grand, some not so grand. Some had tons of character, others not so much. The street always felt to Meg like the set of a movie. When in college, she’d biked on Third to get to campus and always dreamed of owning a house there one day.

“I have a tiny bungalow,” Ahmed said. “Across the street from the school.”

“Sam Hughes? That’s where Violet goes!” Henry said. “She’s my best friend. I want to go there, too, but I have to go where my mom teaches.” He made a face, then brightened suddenly. “Hey, you’re not married, are you?”

“Henry!”
Meg made majorly disapproving eyes at him.
“
That’s crossing the line!”

“What line?”

“The asking-personal-questions-of-men-we-don’t-know line.” She turned to Ahmed. “Sorry.”

“No problem,” he said. “I like his spunk.”

“We do so know him,” Henry said. “What exactly do you call what we’ve been doing for the last hour?” He rolled his eyes at Ahmed, and while Ahmed laughed, Meg sneaked a glance at his left hand. No ring. He caught her looking, and grinned to let her know.

“You don’t date,” he confirmed.

“That’s right.” Feeling her blush spread, Meg stood and moved behind Henry. She pressed her hands into his shoulders. “It was great meeting you,” she told Ahmed.

“Thank you.” Ahmed stood. “I feel the same.”

They fell into another serious lock of the eyes.

“This has been both bizarre and lovely,” she said. “But we’ve got to go.”

When she squeezed Henry’s shoulders, he clambered up, yet Meg couldn’t convince her feet to move.

Ahmed’s smile widened. “Maybe you should stay.”

“Maybe we should.” Meg swallowed hard. “But we’re not going to.”

“Do you want our phone number?” Henry asked.

Dead meat, this kid was.

“Don’t say another word,” Meg warned him.

“I was just—”

“Ah, ah, ah!” She stopped him. “Not. Another. Word.”

Ahmed looked out the window of the coffee shop for a few moments. Meg watched his chest rise and fall rhythmically as she waited for him to look at her again. To
see
her again, in a way that no one had seen her for a long, long time, if ever. When he did look back at her, it was all Meg could do not to gasp. This guy sparked something in her, something deep and real.

“I could give you
my
number,” he said. “In case . . . ?”

“I . . . I . . .”

Meg desperately wanted his number. She wanted to take his hand in both of hers and press it against her chest. She could almost
feel
its impression, so strong was her urge. She wanted to tuck herself into him and feel his arms encircle her waist. To put her head on his shoulder and feel safe, taken care of for a change. She wanted to be six months ahead of now when these urges could be indulged in, when all her single-mom, woman-who’d-been-cheated-on concerns had been appropriately addressed and the need for them declared null and void.

No, Meg,
a voice inside her counseled.
Just keep this one moment perfect.

“I’m going to pass,” she finally said. “Reluctantly, I’ll pass.”

Henry held out his hand. “I’ll take your number.”

Ahmed laughed. “I think you’re part of a package deal.”

“Not necessarily,” Henry said.

“Hello!” Meg gave him a mental head smack. “We’re the packagest of package deals.”

Henry leaned back against her and tilted his head to look up at Ahmed. “We come here almost every Saturday,” he informed him.

Meg clamped her hand over his mouth. “You thwarter!” she said. “You little thwarter!”

Ahmed winked at Henry, then grinned mischievously at Meg. “Maybe I’ll see you guys around sometime, then.”

Henry raised his arms in a cheer and then held out a hand for Ahmed to high-five. Meg stood in openmouthed awe, unable to speak, as Ahmed’s palm met Henry’s in a happy smack.

These boys! These men!

They were incorrigible, every single one of them.

T
hat night, Meg and Henry walked down to campus after having dinner at Rincon Market and bought two general-admission tickets to the University of Arizona men’s baseball exhibition game at the Frank Sancet Stadium. Meg knew she’d find her father there, because he went to every home game, regular season or not, and many practices, too. That was him, Phillip Goodman, loyal to the core.

A pang of love and a lifetime of memories hit Meg when she saw him from behind. As always, he wore his navy blue team shirt. As always, he covered his mostly bald head with a UA baseball cap. As always, he sat alone in his season-ticket spot directly behind the home team batter-up box.

Ever hopeful, he bought two seats each season, but one mostly sat empty. Meg and Henry joined him as often as they could. She loved the whiteness of the ball against the greenness of the grass, and the organ music, and the crack of the bat smacking the ball. She loved the very purity and simplicity of the sport. What she loved most, however, was seeing her dad so content.

Henry bounded down the stadium stairs ahead of Meg and threw his arms around his grandfather from behind. “Hi, Grandpa!”

“Hey!” Pleased to see him, Phillip happily patted Henry’s forearm and ignored the spilled popcorn his exuberant greeting had caused. “Hi, you two! Nice to see you! What’re you two up to? Want some popcorn? It’s tasty tonight.”

He scooted over a seat. Henry plopped into the chair he’d vacated and dug into the bag of popcorn. Arriving, Meg nudged Henry, who stood to allow her to sit and then plunked his lanky body onto her lap.

“How’re you doing, Dad?” Meg asked, accepting a handful of popcorn from the bag he offered.

“Good. I’m doing good.” Phillip adjusted his glasses, his most notable nervous habit.

“Mom tells me you have aspirations of being a painter in Paris.”

Calmly, her dad shook his head. “I never said I wanted to be a painter. I simply said, more than once, who knows what I might want to do with this next part of my life? I’ve worked very hard for many, many years. Tax season’s hell, pardon my French, and—”

“That wasn’t French,” Henry pointed out.

“Don’t interrupt,” Meg scolded.

Phillip shrugged. “I was just making a point, which your mother didn’t get, as usual.”

“I think I get it, Dad,” Meg said. “You’re having your well-deserved midlife crisis.”

She’d said it teasingly, but his return look was direct and even. “Do I look like I’m in crisis?”

Meg peered at him. His eyes were calm, his skin was smooth, and nothing about him suggested crisis. “No,” she said, “you don’t.”

“That’s because I’m not. I’m just thinking through some things.”

“In your usual well-reasoned, contemplative way,” she said.

“One hopes,” her father said.

Henry leapt up from Meg’s lap. “Can I get an eegee and then try to catch foul balls with those kids over there?”

Phillip immediately reached for his wallet. He loved to buy treats for Henry. He’d always bought them for Meg when she was little, too. Cotton candy, giant Pixie Stix, those ridiculous plastic-crap rings in gumball machines—anything to give her an easy joy. Her mother, on the other hand, had been the queen of no.

After Henry left, Phillip slid his gaze back to the game. “Nice breeze tonight, isn’t there?” he said. “I’ve always felt best when there’s a little bit of a breeze in the air. Keeps the world from feeling too stale, too stagnant.”

“Dad?” He raised his eyebrows to acknowledge he’d heard her, but he kept his eyes on the game. “What kind of things are you thinking through?”

His glance to her was quick and a little uncertain, and his swallow came thick and hard. “I’m trying to figure out how to make a few changes in my life without hurting anyone.”

“It’s okay to put yourself first once in a while, Dad,” Meg said. “Do what you need to in order to be happy. If you want to sell your accounting practice or pare it back, go right ahead.”

“It’s not work so much,” he said. “Your mother and I haven’t been happy together for a very long time. You know that, right?”

Yes, Dad. Everyone knows that.
He was thinking divorce. Or separation, or
something
big
.
The startling hugeness of whatever it was, even though it wasn’t entirely unexpected, thudded through Meg’s brain and threatened to waylay the supportive response she wanted to give. She took a moment to center herself before she replied.

“You’ve got such a big heart,” she said. “I hope you make room in it for joy on a scale you’ve not yet experienced.”

Phillip pressed his hands against his heart, touched. “You always see the best in people.”

“I get that from you,” she said.

He turned back to the game, pressing his lips together to keep his emotions in check. Meg studied him thoughtfully. He’d bottled himself up for years, decades, a lifetime. The idea of making a change—of feeling deeply—had to be scary.

“You’ve got a safety net, Dad,” she said. “I hope you know that. When you’re ready to make a leap, I’ll be there for you.”

Without taking his eyes from the game, he patted her knee. Inexplicably, Meg found herself wanting to cry.

 

 

 

After the game, Phillip declined Meg’s invitation to join them at Starbucks, so Meg and Henry settled on the patio after ordering a Mocha Mint Frappuccino for her and an apple juice for him.

For a few minutes, they sat quietly. University Boulevard vibrated with the laughter of college students and the smell of the hookah from Sinbad’s and the occasional
ding-ding
as the trolley came by. While taking it in, Meg also ran through the conversation she wanted to have with Henry. Spending time with Ahmed that day certainly had stirred something in her, but it also seemed to have stirred something in him. Several times since then he’d mentioned Ahmed—how nice he was, how brave to fly on an airplane alone, and, more than once, how he wasn’t married and wasn’t that a pretty neat thing? Henry was smitten with Ahmed in a way Meg found disconcerting.

“Henry?”

He met her eyes. “Mom?”

“On a scale from one to ten, how happy would you say you are?”

Henry, who loved these sorts of questions, got an adorably thoughtful look on his face. “I’d say probably a nine.”

Meg laughed, delighted. “What would it take for you to say ten?”

“An iPod,” Henry said. “Violet’s dad just bought her one, and I want one, too.”

“That’s it?” Meg said. “Just an iPod?”

Henry nodded. “Will you get me one?”

“I’m fine with you being a nine on the happiness scale,” Meg said. “Any happier and you’d be living in la-la land.”

“How about for my birthday?”

“I’m not spending a hundred fifty dollars on an iPod, Henry.” They didn’t even have a computer at home to download music; for e-mail and Web searches, Meg relied on her computer at work. “I can’t even remember the last time I spent that much on
myself.
We don’t have that kind of money, kiddo.”

Henry’s lower lip protruded in a pout, and Meg’s mind immediately began doing loop-de-loops about the iPod. It wasn’t totally about the money. She wanted their world low-tech and high-touch and for Henry’s mind to remain unfettered, hence her limits on TV and video games. Stripping away the distracting gadgets resulted in an in-your-face relationship, and while Henry’s spirited independence was without question a bit much sometimes, Meg wouldn’t trade it for anything. She knew his teenage years would come fast enough and she felt an overpowering urge to

s-l-o-w

l-i-f-e

d-o-w-n.

But life was not cooperating. Henry was catapulting to puberty and Meg knew she’d soon enough lose his affection. Now it was so precious. His class was working on poetry and he’d written “An Ode to My Mother: My mom is like a telephone wire. She connects me to the ones I love
.
” It was taped on the wall outside his classroom. How many more poems like that could she count on? If he had an iPod, he’d walk around with those white ear buds stuck in his ears. She’d become an annoyance to him, an interruption. And then he’d stop writing poetry about her.
You have flowers in your heart,
he’d told her just last week. She’d written it down so she’d never forget.

“Mom?” he said.

“Henry?”

“Maybe I’m not a nine for being happy. Maybe I’m an eight. Or a seven. Or a one.”

The flowers in Meg’s heart wilted. “Henry, please. You’re still very young. Maybe when you’re twelve we’ll get you an iPod.”